Dear Elena
by The Pleasure Principle
Summary: After Bonnie's death Damon finds an old letter from Bonnie addressed to Elena and he makes a drastic decision. One shot.


**Okay so I haven't done this in a while but found this story on my laptop and thought I would share it. I hope you'll enjoy it. Be warned...it's a very sad one. Songs : _Makes Me Wonder_ by Tricky and Marta, _Angel_ by Koda**

* * *

_Dear Elena,_

_I'm a terrible friend. I`ve been a terrible friend to you for quite some time now. Even the reason behind why I'm writing this letter to you is selfish. I need to confess for my own peace of mind. I'm terrified of what I'm about to write and how you will react to it. This is the first time when I'm glad to know that I'll be dead by the time you get to read this. I wouldn't be able to face you and I would most likely carry this guilt to the grave. Maybe that's exactly what I should do. _

_I want you to know that I value our friendship, I have great respect and love for you. This will never change. I have known you my entire life, you've been my best friend since I can remember. I would never be able to hurt you on purpose. I would rather hurt myself than to cause any kind of harm to you._

_But it's hard. Being your best friend is so hard. It's never been easy, given who you are...who I am…We've always faced things most people can't even imagine. We fought together and we always won. Together we conquered the world over and over again no matter what. And when we needed support, you always had me and I always had you._

_This time I'm on my own. This time I have to fight this fight alone and I don't think I'll win. I've been trying with all my strength to fight against this. God knows how hard I've tried but I can't fight it anymore. Fighting it giving me unbelievable pain, pain I never felt before, pain I never thought I would ever feel. It's getting too much and I can't see the way out. I wish I could stop these feelings, I wish I could go back in time and stop them from growing. But they are overpowering me and I can't escape… _

_I'm in love with your boyfriend. And I loathe myself for it. _

_Spending time with him fills me with guilt and unbelievable pain. Seeing him hurts me because I know that he's yours and that is how it should be. He belongs to you, he loves you, he's loyal to you, he makes sacrifices for you and he'll always choose you. _

_And it hurts me. Jealousy is crawling under my skin and painting my veins black. It turns me into a monster. It turns me into someone who hates you for taking my chance away. It turns me into someone who wishes you would've just died instead of entering this fairy tale like sleep, waiting for me to die so you can be saved. This monster hates you for getting your happy ending handed to you so simply. That you just walk back to life so easily right into his open arms. _

_But what I loathe the most in this monster is that it makes me think that I would have a chance if it wasn't for you. It makes me think that he's just as hurt as I am for the feelings we secretly share. It makes me think that when he looks at me guilt fills up his body just like it does mine. It makes me think that the time we spent alone in the prison world started something in him too. It planted the seeds of these bigger, deeper feelings that eventually grew out of them. _

_After awhile, when my mind clears up I realise that these are just fantasies. Fantasies I created to make the pain a bit more bearable. Fantasies that will never be true. Fantasies that make me a horrible friend of yours…_

_I'm sorry Elena, I'm deeply sorry for developing these feelings especially when you`re in such a vulnerable position. If I could I would erase them without a doubt but for that I would have to admit to them out loud and I'm not ready for it yet. I'm not ready to say that I love him. I'm not ready to face the hate I would receive for it from our friends. But I`m horrified that by the time I would be brave enough to erase these feelings it would be too late. I'm terrified of him finding out. Terrified of me not being able to hide it any longer. That these feelings will just burst out of me, leaking through my skin like a disease. I`m afraid I don`t know how to hide it any longer but I know it won't be long before he realizes how I feel. _

_Regardless he will always choose you.._

* * *

Elena woke up in Damon's bed. The sun was shining bright outside, it was a beautiful spring day. To be honest , she found everything beautiful recently. She learned to appreciate the little things in life way more since she missed out on so much of it for so 'll live her life to the fullest she promised this to herself the minute she woke up. It's been 12 days since she's been back from the 'dead'. She sat up in the bed and as her usual morning routine reached over to the nightstand looking for a small leather covered notebook. By the end of her life, Bonnie Bennett filled 29 diaries with details of her and their closest friends' life as she promised. Elena decided to read an entry a day, this way keeping her best friend's memory alive.

Bonnie's death came sooner than anyone had expected. She was only 45 when she died in a heart attack 12 days ago. The spells and the many sacrifices she made throughout her life weakened her body and eventually took her life. Bonnie was buried next to her family in the Mystic Falls cemetery. Damon said she lived a very happy life, travelling the world with her husband Enzo. He is still alive. After Bonnie's funeral he moved to Norway but Elena wasn't sure what is he doing there. Enzo didn't want to meet her, in fact he asked Damon not to bring her to the funeral. Elena understood and respected his wish. After all she was only a reminder of everything bad that happened to them. For her to be alive, Bonnie had to die. Elena didn't blame Enzo for his behaviour towards her. She was glad that Bonnie had someone who loved her this much. She couldn't wait for the entries in her diary about how their relationship blossomed. Damon wasn't too keen to answer the dozens of questions Elena had on this matter. It was probably too soon anyway. But that's why she`s so glad to have the diaries. Elena smiled to this thought and pulled out the small drawer of the nightstand where she usually kept the diary. She rolled her eyes when she realised it's not there. "Damon" she sighed with a warm smile on her lips as she reached over to his nightstand where she found the little book.

Bonnie's death was...is really hard on Damon. Elena learned that over the years they became very close friends, best friends even. He was Enzo's best man on the wedding and kept regular contact with them even while they were all around the globe. Bonnie played such a huge and consistent part of Damon's life that her death left an enormous hole. He's trying to pretend that he's doing fine but it's obvious that he's suffering. Elena tried to speak to him about how is he really dealing with his loss but he's not ready yet to open up about how Bonnie's death really affected him. He spends quite some time in the bar and drinking in general. Elena knew he's trying hard not to but he gets irritated easily and is very argumentative. Talking to him requires more strategic forward thinking than invading a country.

It will pass- Elena thought as she opened the diary to read another story about how Damon saved Bonnie`s life yet again. The morality Damon presented in these entries always impressed Elena. She knew him very well and not killing Bonnie first thing when he found out about the spell went straight against his nature. Against his words. Elena took credit for his behaviour and believed Damon`s unconditional love was the base of this great friendship.

After having a nice hot shower Elena got dressed and headed downstairs for breakfast. Damon was still nowhere to be found which was quite unusual for this time of the morning. "Damon?" Elena called from the stairs thinking that he might be in the kitchen. When she got no answer she headed to the living room but Damon wasn't there either. She let out a loud sigh as she pulled out her phone from the back pocket of her jeans. She lifted the device to her ear but the rings fell silent on the other end. "Great!" She redialled with a rather aggressive push of a button while she walked around the room trying to control her frustration. When she passed by the little wooden table that was standing next to the sofa she halted and turned back. There was a yellowed letter standing against an empty bottle of bourbon. At first she thought she`ll just ignore it and it will stop existing. Her name written on the envelope was looking at her, frightening her. Seeing her name in Damon`s handwriting filled her with questions she wished she could ignore. She reached for the letter with shaking hand and broke the seal. She placed the envelope back to the table and unfolded the letter. To her surprise it was written many years ago. It was from the year when Damon laid down in that coffin next to her thinking that when he finally wakes up they'll reunite.

* * *

_Dear Elena,_

_Writing this letter to you is the hardest and the most painful thing I ever had to do in my entire life. Yet here I am, writing this to you despite the fact that I know very well that it will cause you just as much pain as I`m feeling right now. I'm hurting us. I know that I'm hurting us but I'm so selfish that I do it anyway. _

_Finding you gave sense to my life. We went through hell but it was worth every second. I wouldn't do anything differently, I don't regret a single moment of our history. I'll always think back of our story with love in my heart._

_I wish I could have this conversation with you face to face but I can't afford to wait for you. This is where my selfishness shows the most. You deserve more than a letter. You deserve so much more than this. So much more than what I could ever give to you. My selfish intentions make a perfect goodbye impossible. _

_I want you to know that I wanted to live my life with you. I wanted nothing more than to spend the rest of my life with you and live it as cringy as possible. Live in a quiet town in a big house with a huge garden...have a couple of kids and a dog. I wanted all that...with you. I never wanted any of this to happen. I never wanted to fall in love with someone else. But it happened…_

_I was fighting against it with all my strength. I used every tool I could to fight my feelings expect one…erasing them._

_I tried to keep my promise to you. After everything we went through I feel guilty to throw it all away. I'm telling myself that I would be even more guilty if I would force you to live a life filled with lies. You deserve so much more. You deserve someone who's fully dedicated to you, someone who loves you unconditionally. Leaving you all alone is selfish and cruel but staying would be even more although I know that's not what you believe right now… and I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. _

_I can only hope that you will have someone waiting for you when you wake up. A part of me will always loathe myself for leaving you on your own but I'll do everything in my strength to make your comeback as smooth as possible. As long as I can._

_I'm taking the cure Elena. There is a chance that I'll be dead by the time you wake up. The reason behind this is both selfish and cowardly. On one part if I take the cure, hopefully I don't have to face you. I don't have to see the pain I caused. I don't have to see how much harm I've done this time. _ _The other reason is that I know Bonnie would never turn. By taking the cure I can give us a real chance. A chance for a normal life. Let it be a relationship or a friendship. It will be real and will last a lifetime. _

_I won't go into great detail of how it happened because you probably don't want to hear it but I have to explain, I need you to understand that I fought against it. I never tried to make it happen. I'm not even sure how it happened. I'm not sure how or when exactly I fall in love with Bonnie. I'm not sure when exactly I realised that there's no turning back._

_I was locked up with her in the prison world for 4 months. The time there with her was annoying, stressful and frustrating but it was also something more… it was the start of something. Something that later turned out to be the end of you and me. The end of us. _

_You always saw through me when it came to Bonnie. You always knew that I always looked up at her, I always respected her no matter how I acted on the outside I was amazed by her. _

_Yet I never would've thought that it would ever turn to be like this. I never would've thought that I would fall for her. To me it was always you and only you. When my feelings started to grow towards Bonnie, it was easy to shut them out. For awhile. Slowly it became harder and harder to ignore them but I never gave up fighting against them. I belonged to you. I loved you. What I felt for her had no place in my life. In our life. I was so confident in winning against those stupid feelings. I didn't take it seriously. I pretended that they didn't matter, they are not important. Yet I was unable to shut her out of my life. We became best friends. _

_Despite my growing feelings towards Bonnie, I still believed in us. I still believed in our future and I was willing to do anything to make it happen. So I kept ignoring. I ignored until there was no way of pretending anymore. The more time we spend together, the deeper I fall. I fell so deep by now that I can't see the way out. I know that the only way back to you would be if I would disconnect from Bonnie. This way maybe with time I would be able to climb out of this deep hole I fall into. To disconnect and forget. It would work. I'm sure about this. Turning my emotions off, wiping out my memories are all easy solutions. I could do all of these. For you. The problem is ... I don't want to. I don't want to do this for you. I won't. I'm sorry. I really am but I just can't. _

_I choose Bonnie. _

_I hope you'll forgive me one day._

_Love, _

_Damon_

* * *

The paper slipped out from between her fingers and landed on the floor quietly. Her arm dropped down next to her body; her legs felt shaky. She could hear her breathing getting painfully loud and raspy as panic started to raise from her stomach. In the next moment a sudden realisation froze onto her face. She knew where Damon is. Without any second thoughts, she rushed out of the house, slamming the door behind her.

She knew it was too late even before she got to the cemetery but seeing Stefan already being there only confirmed her fear. He stood with his back at her, holding a small book in his left hand. Elena could see a piece of yellowed paper hanging out from between the pages. She didn't pay too much attention to it. She couldn't look anywhere else than where Stefan was looking. She wished she could've look somewhere else. She wished she could've just turn away, run away, run the opposite direction and never had to live the rest of her life with this picture engraved into her memory. She felt like the whole world was spinning around, her throat run dry, her mind went blank and the sight gave her eyes physical pain. Then she screamed. A loud, deep scream coming from deep inside, gathering all the pain that was too much to stay in her body any second longer.

"Damooooon!" she didn't even realise she moved until she felt Stefan's arms tighten around her body as he tried to keep her away from the flames. " It was his choice. I'm sorry… I'm sorry. This is what he wanted Elena." Stefan tried to keep his voice as steady as possible but he couldn't control the tears rolling down his cheeks. "He wasn't happy. He was suffering." He kept talking even though he knew his words won't change anything and definitely won't make Elena feel less heart broken. As the flames died out, he felt her body collapsing. Elena fall down on her knees while Stefan kept holding her against him kneeling on the ground next to her. He didn't say anything else, he just held her. He will hold her, letting her cry until she would feel too tired to cry.

His eyes wandered off to the little book lying on the ground next to them. An early edition of the _'Call of the Wild', _a book that Damon gave Bonnie a long time ago. A book in which Bonnie hid a letter addressed to Elena telling her about her feelings for Damon. A letter that was never meant to be seen by any of them. He looked towards the headstone. On the top of Bonnie's head stone Damon's silver ring was balancing under the sun. Stefan swallowed. He knew that Damon is finally happy. And what made Stefan feel even happier is the thought of his brother getting his ass kicked by Bonnie in the otherworld.


End file.
